Scenic Routes

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  Scenic Routes In Heat, Al Pacino and Robert De Niro face off—though not in the way audiences expected

  Forget the dinner-table sit-down: There’s a better Pacino/De Niro encounter in Michael Mann’s 1995 crime opus.

  June 17, 2013 | 11:00am -

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  Scenic Routes A simple smile provokes major heebie-jeebies in Deathdream

  With his oddball zombie movie, Bob Clark demonstrates how to twist something as innocuous as a grin into the stuff of nightmares.

  June 3, 2013 | 12:00am -

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  Scenic Routes A quiet scene from The Matrix demonstrates how to make exposition compelling

  Morpheus explains The Matrix by not explaining The Matrix.

  May 20, 2013 | 11:00am -

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  Scenic Routes Shelley Duvall does the talking, but Sissy Spacek may be the real protagonist of Altman’s 3 Women

  Two scenes from Robert Altman’s drama illustrate how a movie’s “main” character is not always the one with all the dialogue.

  May 6, 2013 | 12:00pm -

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  Scenic Routes The big numbers are the lowlight of Dancer In The Dark

  Can Lars von Trier’s musical—or any musical—transcend bad song-and-dance routines?

  April 22, 2013 | 11:00am -

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  Scenic Routes The cats, not the cast, draw viewers’ eyes in Jean Vigo’s classic L’Atalante

  What the film’s remarkable use of felines says about the practice of putting animals in movies.

  April 8, 2013 | 12:00am -

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  Scenic Routes What Quiz Show proves about film directing and Argo’s Best Director snub

  Sometimes the director is just along for the ride.

  March 25, 2013 | 12:00pm -

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  Scenic Routes The mastery of Brick’s opening (annotated by writer-director Rian Johnson)

  The debut feature from the director of Looper starts strong. Here’s what it does and why it works—with thoughts from Johnson himself.

  March 11, 2013 | 12:00am -

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  Scenic Routes The audacious Odd Man Out turns Britain’s biggest star into furniture in his own film

  The barely conscious James Mason serves as the fulcrum for a community drama.

  February 18, 2013 | 12:00pm -

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  Scenic Routes Stop Making Sense’s opening number establishes it as a concert film like no other

  The groundbreaking performance begins with just David Byrne, a boombox, and a void waiting to be filled.

  February 4, 2013 | 12:00am -

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  Scenic Routes 1985’s Tampopo kicked off the era of death threats for loud moviegoers

  The humorous meta opening of this Japanese comedy presaged decades of attempts to get audiences to sit down, shut up, and turn off their watch alarms.

  January 21, 2013 | 12:00pm -

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  Scenic Routes A Moonrise Kingdom montage shows the art of compression isn’t dead

  Team America: World Police may have mocked montages into retreat, but not as far as Wes Anderson is concerned.

  January 7, 2013 | 12:00pm -

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  Scenic Routes Two versions of Bad Santa’s opening scene create different expectations

  Chopin in a pretty shitty situation.

  December 17, 2012 | 12:00pm -

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  Scenic Routes A Drugstore Cowboy scene features drug logic at its most inventively deranged

  A Matt Dillon tirade proves not all drug-fueled thinking has to go for the cheap laugh.

  December 3, 2012 | 11:00am -

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  Scenic Routes Avanti! illustrates how sometimes falling for a movie is like falling in love

  Infatuation and corpses play parts in an odd comedy’s key scene.

  November 19, 2012 | 11:00am -

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  Scenic Routes Little Shop Of Horrors demonstrates the fine art of setting the scene

  One of the last great movie musicals gets off to a stunning start.

  October 29, 2012 | 11:30am -

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  Scenic Routes A seemingly superfluous scene says a lot about Margaret’s meaningful messiness

  Why stop the movie to debate King Lear?

  September 24, 2012 | 12:00pm -

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  Scenic Routes In The Court Jester, Danny Kaye’s life depends on getting the words right 

  The pellet with the poison’s in the vessel with the pestle, right? 

  September 10, 2012 | 11:00am -

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  Scenic Routes How The War Of The Roses highlights Danny DeVito’s brief directorial genius 

  As a filmmaker, Danny DeVito is no Charles Laughton… or is he?

  August 20, 2012 | 11:00am -

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  Scenic Routes The French drama La Haine makes unusually good use of a restroom 

  In a dizzying movie, a convoluted bathroom story just adds to the spin. 

  August 6, 2012 | 1:00pm -

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  Scenic Routes Why Glengarry Glen Ross’ Alec Baldwin scene is so unusual 

  James Foley’s one perfect film proves there are more important things than fidelity to source material.

  July 23, 2012 | 11:00am -

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  Scenic Routes Intacto illustrates the value of not knowing what’s going to happen next

  Sometimes the less you know the better. 

  June 25, 2012 | 12:00pm -

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  Scenic Routes Greenberg

  Noah Baumbach destroys suspended disbelief in a single scence.

  May 29, 2012 | 12:00pm -

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  Scenic Routes David Lynch shows how audio can be creepier than any image in Eraserhead

  In David Lynch's hands, film isn't only a visual medium.

  May 14, 2012 | 1:00pm -

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  Scenic Routes Vincent Gallo’s Buffalo ’66 takes a break for a lyrical tap-dance routine

  Bowling and tap dance. 

  April 30, 2012 | 12:00pm -

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  Scenic Routes The French Connection

  There’s no faking the danger in this famous chase scene. 

  April 16, 2012 | 12:00pm -

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  Scenic Routes Humpday

  Capturing the details of a dare, without a script.

  April 2, 2012 | 12:00pm -

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  Scenic Routes Touch Of Evil

  What makes the famous opening of an Orson Welles film work?

  March 19, 2012 | 12:00pm -

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  Scenic Routes Pi 

  In a subway station late at night, a suffering protagonist plays tricks with his brain—or is it with someone else’s? 

  March 5, 2012 | 12:00am -

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  Scenic Routes Belle De Jour 

  Luis Buñuel explores the mysteries of desire—and the contents of a buzzing box—in an unsettling, erotic scene. 

  February 20, 2012 | 12:00pm -